The new face of green movements

The roots of today's environmentalist movements go back to the second half of the 1800s. In his anthology, McKibben (2008) points out that in this period, Romantic poets such as John Ruskin or Octavia Hill were already writing pieces of literature about the damage caused by the Industrial Revolution. In the decades that followed, environmentalism reached milestones and by the early 1900s, several conservation groups had already been formed, including The Sierra Club in 1892 or The Wilderness Society in 1935. In response to increasing pollution, Greenpeace, the world's best-known environmentalist NGO, was founded in the 1960s, and a decade later these initiatives were already important actors in public policy debates and political decision-making (Cox & Pezzullo, 2017).

But what is the situation today, looking back over several decades? A glimpse at the media, for example, The New York Times, shows that although the visibility of the environment as a topic has been constant over the past decades, the newspaper published barely ten articles per year on the issue between 1980 and 2015 (Romps & Retzinger, 2019). The following years saw a rise in media attention towards environmental issues due to both natural disasters such as Hurricane Katrina in 2005 or the 2010 Haiti earthquake and the increasing frequency of international summits and conventions including the 2015 Paris Agreement or the COP conferences.

It is also worth mentioning that in 2007, former U.S. Vice President Al Gore was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, together with the IPCC, for his scientific clarification of the role of human activities in climate change. This was based on the scientific findings of U.S. climatologist and geophysicist Michael E. Mann, Director of the Center for Science, Sustainability and Media at the University of Pennsylvania. This groundbreaking finding not only fundamentally changed the approach of climate science, but also resulted in a swift and proportionate media response. In fact, from a media history perspective, 2018 and 2019 were the two years that saw an unprecedented increase in the media coverage of environmental issues.

One of the undisputed reasons for this was the emergence of Greta Thunberg, a Swedish climate activist who, at the age of 16, started protesting in front of the Swedish Parliament on Fridays during school hours. The Fridays for Future (FFF) movement launched by her and associated with her name has grown to become one of the most successful climate movements of all time and has generated media attention around the world. A look at social media produces a striking example: the global climate strike of 15 March 2019 was mentioned more than 60,000 times on Twitter, as seen on the graph below.

Graph 1: Mentions of Greta Thunberg and Fridays for Future on Twitter (Source: medium.com, 2019)

FFF is currently present in 7,500 cities (including Budapest) and has more than 14 million followers worldwide. Their manifesto includes keeping the global average temperature increase below 1.5°C compared to pre-industrial levels, guaranteeing climate justice and climate equality, enforcing the Paris Agreement and reaching consensus on scientific issues. Local and intermittent global climate strikes held on Fridays are Fridays for Future’s chief campaigning method. Thunberg’s personality and the launch of FFF both fueled significant media attention upon their emergence, resulting in the term ‘Greta effect’ being coined by journalists to illustrate the key role of Thunberg and her ‘brand’ in the creation of a global movement (Sorce, 2022).

Greta Thunberg’s character proved divisive from the start, and camps of enthusiastic supporters, sharp critics and insulters quickly emerged in society. Although there has been much speculation on social media and in mainstream media outlets about who might be behind the ‘Greta phenomenon’, no credible explanations have been provided so far. In terms of media coverage and public outreach – and raising awareness among young people in particular –, it is clear that Friday protests have managed to provoke some kind of reaction from even the least engaged members of the public and that the issue of climate change has been dominating media discourse to an unprecedented extent.

One of the important characteristics of Fridays for Future is that it is based on today’s young generation (known in literature as Generation Z, or those born between 1995 and 2010). Over the past few years, several representative surveys, in both Europe and the United States, have shown that members of Generation Z in general are not only extremely interested in environmental issues, but are also most concerned about the environment and the Earth (Pew Research Center 2021; Ipsos 2022; VeryWellMind 2022). This concern is often manifested in the growing number of young people joining a movement they find appealing.

In addition to Fridays for Future, Extinction Rebellion (XR) is a further major group. As suggested by its name, Extinction Rebellion pursues a more radical agenda. This is consistently reflected in their campaign messages and language, including the use of terms like ‘climate emergency’ and ‘climate crisis’, while calling for immediate action by decision-makers. XR sees the ability to mobilize primarily in rebellion and civil disobedience, in addition to the active use of various social media platforms. In their own words, “We have no other choice. We rebel against the systems that got us here. We rebel for the future we want.” Originally established in the UK, it now has 1185 branches around the world (including Australia, Brazil, Canada, Indonesia, Hungary, etc.) since being launched in 2018 and is currently present in eighty-six countries. What sets them apart from other movements is that, in addition to environmentalism and climate change, they are the most intense advocates for social issues, such as the rights of women, people of color, and gender minorities, and these matters are reflected in their campaigns in some form or another.

The most radical strand of new environmental movements is represented by Letzte Generation, a relatively recently established group. Letzte Generation’s actions last year not only made the headlines repeatedly, but also provoked sometimes violent and hostile reactions from society at large. A coalition calling itself the ‘last generation’ is also fighting against oil and gas exploitation through civil disobedience. Their demands are addressed directly to the German federal government, calling on decision-makers to limit the maximum speed on German motorways to 100 km/h and to reduce the price of public transport in Germany to a maximum of nine euros. Civil disobedience itself is defined as a non-violent form of political protest. It is attributed to Henry David Thoreau, who in 1846 refused to pay taxes in protest against slavery in the U.S.

From mass hunger strikes to roadblocks and various acts of resistance, disobedience can take a variety of forms. An important feature of all of these, however, is that they must be non-violent acts. Letzte Generation attracted attention most notably when its members entered museums as civilians and ultimately attempted to deface famous works of art with actions such as pouring pea soup over a Van Gogh painting in Italy or hurling tomato soup at a Monet masterpiece. An extensive list of artworks ‘attacked’ last year has been drawn up. This was topped by the death of a forty-four-year-old woman last year when roadblocks and demonstrations prevented an ambulance from reaching her in time (Hill, 2022).

The movements mentioned above are only a small sample of increasingly numerous movements evolving around a more and more specific topic, such as climate change, climate justice, oil, etc. They should not be overlooked, mainly because of their ability to attract large numbers of young people, typically in Western societies. They play an extremely important role in identity shaping and community building among Generation Z. A representative survey of 3,000 young people aged 17 to 20 in Norway, for example, shows that the emergence of Greta Thunberg has been highly important for them in terms of their ability to voice their opinions and their commitment to environmental protection (Haugseht, J.A & Smeplass, E., 2022). Meanwhile, we can also see that the young generation is essentially transforming the nature of activism. Through technology, they can make their voices heard like never before, and whereas prior to the millennium a movement had to make a serious effort to even appear in the media, today user-produced content guarantees instant access and exposure.

What are the critical points that arise in connection with the new movements? One such aspect is the question of political participation. While certain movements, such as Fridays for Future, have declared their refusal to engage or express themselves on political issues, others, such as Letzte Generation, are explicitly political actors in the environmental discourse and address their messages to other political actors. The basis of the whole phenomenon – namely, the intertwining of environmentalism and politics – is, in my opinion, the rhetorical question whether it is possible for any green movement today to remain apolitical.

Environmentalism as an ideology, and within it the management of climate change and its impacts, is inseparable from the political sphere. This is due to the fact that solutions are partly expected to be reached and decisions are expected to be taken in the realm of politics. However, the Right and the Left have recently become increasingly divided on the issue, and this divergence is even reflected in the language used, as evidenced by the opposing camps of ‘climate deniers’ and ‘climate alarmists’. Such issues, and the matter of environmental protection in general, should ideally rise above often opposing political ideologies and provide an opportunity for united action instead of forming further antagonisms. For all these reasons, however, a critical eye must be kept on the political direction taken by a movement, its sources of funding, as well as whose interests it represents and why.

It is no secret that movements such as Extinction Rebellion, Just Stop Oil, and Insulate Britain are the brainchildren of an activist named Roger Hallam. All three, but especially the latter two, have staged a number of demonstrations which have gone beyond the ‘desirable’ limits of civil disobedience and ended in violence, therefore culminating in arrests (Hallam himself has been in prison several times). As a doctoral student at an institute of King’s College London, the movements’ father focused his research on how and by what means it is possible to radicalize a movement to the limit, while maximizing its political engagement. In 2019, in an interview with Die Zeit, he provoked the fury of the media with a statement claiming that the Holocaust was “just another fuckery in human history”. Extinction Rebellion Germany itself condemned Hallam’s disparaging and relativizing statements about the Holocaust; the organization tweeted that he was no longer welcome in Germany (Connolly & Taylor, 2019).

There is also the question of how effective civil disobedience is in terms of campaigning. All of these movements have made it clear that their aim is to use these means to draw public attention to the problems of climate change, greenhouse gas emissions, and so on. It is certainly true that for a while, these actions grab the attention of the media and its audiences, but as several recorded reactions from the background suggest, they are perceived by the target audience as rather negative. It is no coincidence, therefore, that the UK chapter of Extinction Rebellion announced on social media earlier this year that it is moving away from civil disobedience and will “prioritize relationships over roadblocks”. In doing so, the organization acknowledged that this kind of campaigning had not been as effective as they had hoped.

In conclusion, there are many new movements emerging today, either fighting for a specific issue or for the protection and preservation of the natural environment in a broader sense. The base of these groups consists mostly of young people, who are more interested in this issue than any other generation. We are witnessing a new era of movements, which has seen activism extending into the online realm and social media platforms becoming the primary means of mobilization. This implies the possibility of any kind of content appearing online, including (scientific) fake news and unwarranted fearmongering.

These movements have an impact on society in many ways, and therefore, like everything else, they should be viewed critically. In my opinion, as we have seen above, it is impossible to act in favor of something (in this case, the environment) by inflicting unnecessary harm upon others, be it human life or works of art. I believe it is important that the background of these organizations and the motivations of their leaders are transparent and that they do not use their actions to deepen political divisions by exploiting young people’s enthusiasm or fear of the future. At the same time, it is to be welcomed that environmental protection has become part of the mainstream media discourse and that young people are willing to take action for a noble cause